Invincible

by Dawn Metcalf

  She patted his third shoulder. “Too late now. Everyone is already in position. Now it’s only a matter of waiting.”

  “I know,” the great toad murmured, squinting under the blaze of the sun. “That is what I find most disconcerting.”

  “Has anyone ever said that you’re kind of a control freak?”

  Graus Claude slid his gaze sideways. “Not in my presence.”

  Joy knew she should have been worried, anxious, nervous, nauseous, but the truth was that she felt great. She craved this feeling—anticipation—like a drug. This was how she weighed her own growth and progress, measuring herself against a skilled opponent, moments before the big event. Without it, she’d been floundering, wondering, waiting to be judged, but she’d always been her harshest critic as well as her greatest coach. She didn’t need someone to tell her that she could do this. She already knew, deep in her missing heart, that they’d already won.

  Joy just had to get everyone else to see it, too.

  “By the Swells,” the Bailiwick complained under his breath. He mopped his sweaty brow with a monogrammed kerchief. The eelet translated his growing unease.

  “Is everybody ready?” Joy asked Inq. The Scribe spread her fingers, scanning the field and forest, and nodded.

  “Your furry friends have all arrived,” she confirmed.

  Ysabel’s werewolf pack had been all too willing to be their scouts and formal witnesses to the oncoming clash. Joy had pulled in every favor and friend she had on this side of the Twixt.

  “Sound off,” Raina said into her earpiece.

  The Cabana Boys and all of her friends answered in curt bursts like gunfire at a range. It made the quiet seem quieter after they’d finished. There was only the lonely crunch and skitter of leaves across the gravel drive.

  “May I ask what those are for?” Graus Claude indicated the clump of oak leaves by her feet.

  “Backup plan,” Joy said. “From the Glendale Oak. In case this doesn’t work.”

  The Bailiwick groaned, his palsy quiver more pronounced. “Let us pretend that I did not hear that and that you did not, under any circumstances, intentionally damage the Glendale Oak, which, aside from alerting every Forest born within a hundred leagues, would no doubt insult the King and Queen, who happen to be the ones that planted it there!” The last words were hissed between rows of shark teeth. Joy inched away from the offending twig. Graus Claude grimaced. “Exactly who was it that suggested this brilliant idea?”

  Joy twisted her fingers. “Um, Avery.”

  “Who received his information from—?”

  Joy swallowed. “The Tide.”

  “Who, I might add, take their orders from—?”

  “Sol Leander,” Joy whispered. “No! Aniseed.”

  The great amphibian nodded. “You are learning.”

  “Great,” she said weakly. “So much for Plan Z.”

  “I wouldn’t concern yourself overmuch,” the Bailiwick sighed. “If this doesn’t work, I’m afraid we won’t be around to try anything else.”

  Joy wrapped her finger around the thin gold chain at her neck. “I get the sense that you’re less than enthusiastic about our current plan.”

  “Forgive me. I find myself quite anxious at the prospect of confronting my ex-lover and political rival as well as my mentor, all of my clients and professional colleagues while completely exposed on all sides standing in the middle of an empty football field!”

  Joy rocked on her heels. “If it makes you feel any better, it’s a soccer field.”

  The Bailiwick’s eyes narrowed dangerously. He huffed. “Americans.”

  Monica walked over to Joy and whispered in her ear. “What’s with Mr. Toad?”

  “He’s feeling a little nervous,” Joy said.

  “He’s feeling nervous?” Monica said. “What about me? I thought Goth Girl Friday said I’d be safer with you, but this feels one hundred and eighty degrees south of safe.”

  Joy eyed Graus Claude, who glared at Monica with calculated interest. “Well, in a sense, you are much safer here.” She hesitated to add the truth that tingled on her tongue. “And, in another sense, you’re also bait.”

  Monica’s glare narrowed to a squint. “Say that again?”

  “Incoming,” Ink said. Everyone tensed like a fist.

  This is it. Joy knew she should feel her heart hammering, but it wasn’t there. There was only the hollowness and the one question: Who would be first?

  A moment of nothing and then there he was—starlight cloak blazing, eyes furious.

  “What manner of idiocy have you orchestrated this time?” Sol Leander growled as he stepped closer to the ring of combatants. The deposed representative ignored the weapons as well as those who held them, glaring directly at Joy and Graus Claude. Joy hesitated to answer. She honestly couldn’t tell which of them he was talking to. “I am expected elsewhere, as I am certain you know, and have therefore come to collect my charge.” He reached a hand toward Monica. “Miss Reid, if you please.”

  Joy turned to Monica. “You could go with him, you know,” she said. “He is sworn to keep you safe.”

  But Monica planted her Jimmy Choos firmly in the grass.

  “Forget it,” Monica said. “I’m staying.”

  Joy felt a little bit proud and very, very guilty, but Joy needed all the help that she could get, and this was one way to get it. Joy felt horrible and triumphant that her best friend had accepted her role as part of the plan. Joy told herself that she was being honest and cautious, manipulative and sneaky, underhanded and conniving and no-holds-barred-cruel, but it was ultimately for the good of both worlds.

  It still made her feel Other Than.

  “Disobedience is not an option,” Sol Leander said.

  Monica cocked a hip. “I’m not going with you.”

  Sol Leander strode forward. Several guns shifted to train on him.

  “You must leave!” he said through clenched teeth.

  Ink appeared next to Monica with his straight razor. “Why?”

  “Because,” Avery said, materializing in a swirl of feathers and coattails. “If his charge will not withdraw from the danger, then my master will be obligated to remain at her side.” The pale courtier sounded positively delighted by the prospect. “And then I, of course, would be thus obligated, too.” He bowed. “In deference to my master.”

  Joy and Graus Claude shared identical smiles full of teeth.

  “You are welcome to join us,” the Bailiwick said, “provided you agree to allying with our cause, adhering to the wishes of your charge that she remain, and to provide aid toward her purpose, namely, protecting Miss Malone, defeating Aniseed and bearing witness to the Imminent Return.”

  Sol Leander shivered, a ripple of disgust shuddered under his cloak. He calmed himself with visible effort, his hands wrung into fists. He glared at Monica, who matched him, stare for stare. The signatura through her left eyebrow wrinkled as it raised in question.

  “I swear it,” he said hotly. “By the sun and the stars and the infinite skies.” He snapped his cloak and tucked his hands neatly into his sleeves. “May I join your doomed company?”

  “Indeed,” Graus Claude said graciously. Raina whistled a sharp noise through her teeth and the guns lowered to let him pass. Avery took a similar oath and stepped into the circle of Folk and humans.

  “Doomed, you say?” Luiz piped from his post. “That doesn’t sound promising.”

  Sol Leander primly straightened his cloak. “She will c
rush you, all of you, if the Tide doesn’t get here first.”

  “We’re kind of counting on it,” Joy said. Sol Leander scowled.

  “I warned you what would happen if you placed your friend in danger.”

  “She didn’t,” Monica said. “I volunteered.”

  Joy reached out and squeezed Monica’s hand, a chocolate-vanilla swirl.

  Ink stood by the two of them. “That is everyone.”

  “Okay, then,” Joy said. “Ready?”

  There was a chorus of “ready”s punctuated by popping clips, clicks and snaps, and a low, buzzing drone.

  Joy fished inside her pocket. It had taken a lot of searching, but she had found what she wanted on the pavement at school: a single, tiny seed. She pinched her fingers around it, picked a direction and threw.

  The seed landed outside the circle, hitting the dirt. It erupted into a thick bush of wicked black thorns, marring the smooth perfection of Abbot’s Field—something Joy felt like a punch to the gut.

  Sol Leander sneered. “I fail to see the purpose of these theatrics.”

  “It’s a message,” Joy said, carefully. “To let them know where we are.”

  She glanced back at the trees surrounding the parking lot and lining the edge of the field. If they came through the forest, it would be from that direction. If they came through Earth, she would feel it underfoot. If they came by Air, they had a clear view of the sky. If by Water, both she and Graus Claude would hear them come.

  One way or another, Joy doubted they’d be waiting long.

  The thorn bush shuddered, branches rattling, dark spikes morphing into quills as something manifested, taking shape, uncurling, rolling backward and out, standing up suddenly on bulky, clawed feet. A snout poked out from the furry flesh. A rat’s tail flopped. Piggy eyes blinked. Briarhook still wore the remnants of his disguise from Under the Hill, stained, muddy, bloody and torn—it was as if the giant hedgehog preferred to wear rags and reek of half-dead meat. Tuan pulled his shirt collar over his nose. Briarhook smiled with rotten teeth.

  “Waiting for you, I,” her tormentor said in broken English. “Long for this. End this. Promised you, I!”

  “You did,” Joy said past the lump in her throat. “We have an arrangement.” Kurt wordlessly lifted the iron box. It contained the last of Briarhook’s heart. “Consider it insurance to stay just where you are.”

  He scratched at the scabs around the metal plate in his chest and chuckled with the sound of rusty saws.

  “Maybe let segulah tear pieces, you,” he said. “Rip skin, chew flesh, crack bones, you, eh?” His long quills bristled, claws digging into the earth. “What think, you?”

  There was a yelping snap behind them.

  “A fine idea,” Aniseed said, flowing out of the woods. She dropped the body of a broken wolf like a discarded shawl.

  Several weapons swung to face her. She was easily eleven or twelve feet tall. It was impossible to believe that those without the Sight could miss her—she was a towering presence, gleaming and glorious. An enormous gown of forest green velvet hung from her shoulders, its edges lined in gold and copious orange fur. A generation of vixen tails curled around her neck and her dark wooden eyes whirled as she smiled. She ignored the growls of the circling pack as they melted out of the woods, lips curled, teeth bared.

  “I see you’ve made this easy for me,” Aniseed purred, stroking a hand down her stole. “Or perhaps this isn’t what it seems—could it be a trap?” The dryad’s face contorted into a frown, and even that was beautiful. “Oh dear, I expected more from you, Graus Claude. Administrational duties have dulled your edge.”

  “You speak with false knowledge and a tongue that isn’t yours,” he said mildly. “Neither it, nor you, are as sharp as you think.” He wore his samurai suit of armor and carried a weapon in each hand—two ancient polearms, a sword and an automatic rifle. He squatted, holding them at cardinal points. “Your thoughts are secondhand, your parent’s goal, a sham.” He sighed. “Aniseed was intelligent, passionate, gifted beyond peer—I knew her well.” His icy gaze pierced. “You are nothing more than her shadow made flesh.”

  “No, Claude. I am here. This is me,” she said, creaking closer. “You have pearls to store your memories, I have seeds.” She stroked her foxtail ruff. “I’ve survived the Council’s petty Edicts, your pet assassins and my ill-promised Fate. I have cheated death, old pollywog, and no one knows better how rare that can be. Look around you—do you think that shall happen with any one of you?” She tilted her head coyly. “We are not ones born to submit, you and I—we know better—we are better. We make our own rules.” She became strangely earnest, her madness sounding more like a plea. “We defied them once before—do you remember, my love? And it almost destroyed us. It could be different this time.”

  “No,” he sighed, apologetic, sincere. “There is no ‘we,’ because you are not her,” he whispered. “For good or ill, you are not her.”

  She shrugged a shapely shoulder, her polished skin flecked with blood. “So be it.”

  Joy swallowed. “Now.”

  Ink sank his blade into the ground, igniting a spark that raced along the curve of a ward that flared into life, surrounding them all. It crackled with waves of incandescent light.

  Aniseed frowned. “What is this?”

  “You once asked me for my signatura,” Ink said crisply. “Here it is.”

  The ouroboros flamed, a dragon swallowing its tail, its scales, a thousand tongues of lapping yellow-gold, encircled all of them in its infinite waves; its eye was a single, yellow crystal, a golden clasp that once held a precious double strand of pearls. The energy of the ward was turning the gemstone sooty black. It cracked with a sudden pop.

  Aniseed tipped her chin back and laughed. It seemed unfair that Kurt’s killing stroke had left no scar on her graftling’s throat. “Poor dumb creature,” she said. “You are defective, defunct. You have no more magic than you have a soul. Do you think you’ve trapped me inside this ward with you? You think that will save anyone? I’ll simply tear you all to ribbons,” she said, smiling. “I’ve done it before.”

  Briarhook’s quills quivered in anticipated pleasure. His claws scratched the soil.

  “On the contrary,” Graus Claude said. “The ward is less to keep you in, than to keep them out.”

  Everyone craned their heads as the winds changed. The barometer dropped. Ionic static licked the air. Massive clouds gathered in layers overhead. The field suddenly reeked of pine and brimstone and rain. The ground trembled like distant thunder, a shudder under their feet. Joy felt every hair on her body stand on end. Monica’s mouth dropped open.

  “Oh no, sir!”

  A shadow the size of a 747 snaked across the field. Trees bent in the sudden gale, spraying leaves and seeds and fairy Folk. The Forest Folk stepped lithely out of branches or through broken bark. The ground spat out brownies, dwarves and rocks that formed shapes, pushing their way blindly forward. Pixies and sprites, nagas and djinn, banshees, basilisks, gargoyles and gryphons flew out of the sky by the dozens, soaring low on outstretched wings, curls of smoke and rolls of colorful carpet. Giants squatted near dryads, elves stood by lizard kings, ghostly wraiths slipped through phookas and bunyips, and nixies dismounted from dripping hippocamps while geysers of fire erupted, spewing handsome, long-limbed warriors with glowing pet salamanders perched on their backs.

  Then the mighty dragon, Bùxiŭ de Zhēnzhū, landed with all the Council members gathered alon
g his length. His smoky mustaches undulated along his thick mane, his teeth dripped saliva down his thin chin beard.

  Councilex Maia held up her right hand; the tip of her forefinger was sooty black.

  “Ye summoned me, Councilex Claude?” she asked.

  “Indeed,” the Bailiwick said. The Cabana Boys kept the segulah trained in their sights. “I have summoned the Council and the members of the Twixt here to bear witness to the charges brought against the graftling, Aniseed, who has—with full intent and foreknowledge—adopted her parental memories and mission to actively forestall the Imminent Return by reinstating herself on the Council through coercion, usurping the monarchy by collusion, and pursuing the annihilation of four-fifths of the human population, in direct violation of the Accords, to further her private agenda of revenge. I therefore charge the graftling, Aniseed, a traitor and self-proclaimed autocrat bent on genocide, regicide and the premeditated attempted murder of the changeling, Joy Malone, and myself, as the Bailiwick of the Twixt—” If any of the Council were surprised by Graus Claude’s claims, none showed it. Joy held her breath, waiting for the frog’s coup de grâce. “—As witnessed by all those present as well as the King and Queen of the Twixt.”

  There was a tumult of murmurs, screams and shrieks, clicks, grunts and squawks, but none of the horror matched the expression on Aniseed’s face.

  “You lie!” she spat, reeling, off balance and afraid. “They are not here! They haven’t Returned!”

  Folk loyalty was absolute—betrayal was impossible, which was why the original Aniseed had cast a spell to make everyone—including herself—forget the King and Queen. One could not be loyal to that which no one could remember. Her crime, if known by them, would be unforgivable.

  “They abandoned us! We can rule ourselves!” She appealed to those beyond the ward. “We will take back this world and claim our rightful place as gods!”

  Graus Claude shook his head sadly, jowls swinging. “Alas, that is precisely the sort of myopic inanity I referenced when I said that you are a mere shadow of your predecessor,” he said. “Aniseed would never have accused anyone, let alone me, of such an absurdity, and would have paid careful attention to my phrasing in order to glean my true intent.” He leaned forward, head bobbing between the halberd and the rifle butt. “I did not say that they were here—I said that they were watching you.”